totally unrelated but america really loves its acronyms. feel like american english makes way more use of acronyms than british english. - ThreadSky

gemofamara.com • 1 day ago

totally unrelated but america really loves its acronyms. feel like american english makes way more use of acronyms than british english.

Reposted from Polling USA

Those Who Say (X) Agency Should Be Eliminated:

DOGE: 25%
USAID: 21%
DOE: 17%
IRS: 13%
FEMA: 11%

EPA: 8%
CDC: 7%
CFPB: 7%
ICE: 5%
FBI: 4%
NWS: 2%
DOD: 1%

YouGov / Feb 18, 2025 / n=1603

Comments

maraflint.bsky.social•1 day ago

The one that stands out to me is the way everyone refers to states by a two letter code all the time.
To me, about half of them mean “somewhere in the USA”.

alehud42.bsky.social•1 day ago

Part of it is that most of our governmental institutions are ancient ("Home Office", "Treasury")

yeeyee187.bsky.social•1 day ago

AUKUS

mel.bzky.team•1 day ago

all the bri'ish agencies have an HM in them though, wonder what that's about

gemofamara.com•1 day ago

really got lucky their that "his majesty's" and "her majesty's" are the same acronym, would've bankrupted the country having to change that

mel.bzky.team•1 day ago

they'll forbid a non-binary monarch for this specific reason

maraflint.bsky.social•1 day ago

They’ll just have to be “Hir Majesty “

gemofamara.com•1 day ago

every american sports league is a three letter acronym. drink driving is a "DUI". chief executive becomes "CEO" (more often shortened to "chief exec" in uk). stuff like that.

andykebede.bsky.social•1 day ago

so many bills introduced in congress have names that are purposely constructed so that they have an acronym to refer to it by. It’s an addiction of its own here

jameshupp.bsky.social•1 day ago

In 2001 the Secretary of Health and Human Services renamed a sub agency "Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services". But he believed a 3-letter acronym sounded better than 4 so he had departmental counsel write a memo to support the proposition that it was legal to abbreviate it CMS rather than CMMS.

williameburns.bsky.social•1 day ago

This gets radically expanded when you're dealing with the American military.

dariustahir.bsky.social•1 day ago

the Anglo equivalent that gets me every time is shortening "Office of [whatever]" to "Ofwhat." not sure why.

nathanaclark.bsky.social•1 day ago

🤔

gemofamara.com•1 day ago

yes, some american english terms have gradually slipped into my usage. no, i am not happy about it.

gemofamara.com•1 day ago

at the same time, there are a lot of us-derived usages of english most brits don't even know they're using, so

bassman93.bsky.social•1 day ago

There's probably still a distinction where Americans say C-O-O and Brits pronounce it as the word coo

frazbelina.bsky.social•1 day ago

I went to UEA (aka, University of Excessive Acronyms), which is my rare experience of this phenomenon over here.

tonekusatsu.bsky.social•1 day ago

United States government LOVES them, especially in the DoD. They have whole sub cultures on the DoD where its people spouting acronyms at each other. It’s like another language

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